Tuesday, March 25, 2008

I've spent the past few days sewing labels and sleeves on quilts, 6 to be exact. Have been letting that particular not-fun task slide, obviously. Last week I shot some slides of two quilts and have really been thinking about the necessity of slides. In the past I always shot an entire roll of 36 slides on one quilt so that I never had to have dupes made. Since nearly everybody is moving towards digital for show entry and there is less need for slides, I opted for doing 2 quilts on one roll. I still have another roll of slide film stored in the freezer and one more pre-paid development mailer, so I will eventually use it. But after that, who knows.

All of my quilts these days are irregularly shaped, with edges that jut out. I like this but it presents a bit of a challenge when determining where to sew the sleeve. With a quilt that has an even and horizontal top edge, it's easy - just mark a point an inch or so down from the top and stitch. But when the top is both uneven and not exactly horizontal, eyeballing it is not going to work. I have to hang the quilt up and adjust it until it looks right, then use a string and a level to mark a horizontal line. Not a lot of extra work, but just enough to be annoying.

My daffodils are opening; here's a few pictures. Sorry if they're a little blurry but it's only 29 degrees outside this morning. Looks like Spring, but doesn't quite feel like it.

And one last note: Free ground shipping on Guild.com for every item purchased through March 31. See my work.

Thursday, March 13, 2008

This is the cover of the brochure that Smith-Kramer Fine Art Services has published for the Surface Design Association's touring exhibit "Sum of the Parts". I'm thrilled to see that they have put my piece on the cover, plus used the detail shot for the background of the rest of the brochure. It's actually quite an elaborate brochure as it unfolds to 6 "pages" wide. There is an explantion about the exhibit, bios for the jurors, a list of the artists, a blurb about the Surface Design Association, and pictures of 6 pieces from the show. Seven, when you include mine. This show will be touring for 3 years. I purchased the CD catalog of the entire show from SDA and for the touring show they selected 100 pieces. I hope it comes to a location near me because I would love to see it for real.

Tuesday, March 11, 2008

It's much more like Spring than it is Winter these days. I can hear birds singing and see flocks of robins scrounging around in the grass. My daffodils are up about 6 inches (but not yet blooming), the snowdrops are almost finished, and here and there crocus peek through the groundcover. Hooray! In another few weeks I will hang my hummingbird feeder and keep an eye out for the first hummer to show up.

It's cloudy today so the crocus haven't opened up.

The time switch to daylight savings time messes up my inner clock for a few days. I find I'm starting dinner later than usual because it's still too bright out. I guess our bodies are more attuned to the quality of light than we think they are.

And I've been stitching away on my current work. I don't keep track of the amount of time I spend in the studio (although I should if only just to prove to the IRS that yes, this is a job and not just a hobby) but I can estimate based on how many audio books I have listened to while doing this. So far it's 3, with a total of 30 hours, and I'm not finished yet. I have to listen to something while I stitching otherwise it's just too boring.

A few quick shots of the grid quilting. So far I've used only lightweight rayon and cotton threads for this piece. Previously I've used heavy and midweights also, but this piece seems too delicate. The heavy quilting makes the areas that aren't quilted puff up and I'm trying to decide how much I like that. I may add some hand done seed stitching there to reduce the puff. I'll need to watch a movie to do that.